Description
A watercolour showing a view of Osborne pier. The pier is shown to the left, stretching from the beach to the sea. Three children are shown playing on the pier, with an older child shown on the beach. Two figures are shown in a rowing boat, to the right, and a sailing ship is shown behind.
Inscribed lower right: Osborne Pier September 1880
Verso: an ink drawing showing a house by a lake. The lake is shown in the foreground to the right, surrounded by rushes and trees. The house is shown to the left, with smoke billowing from the chimney.
Descriptive Medium: 'Pencil, watercolour and touches of bodycolour, brush and ink on verso', 'pencil, watercolour, bodycolour (touches of), brush and ink'
Image Licence
All Rights Reserved
Image Credit
© Royal Collection Trust
Location
Osborne, East Cowes, Isle of Wight, England
Country
England
Tags
Category
Landscapes & Seascapes
TWW Comment
The Victoria pier was a few hundred yards to the east of Ryde Pier. It was promoted by the Stokes Bay Pier and Railway Company to provide a landing for a rival ferry service from Gosport. It opened in 1864 as the main pier was getting its tramway. Being somewhat shorter than Ryde Pier, it could not be used at all points of the tide, and so offered little competition to the main Ryde to Portsmouth ferry services. When the Stokes Bay company was acquired by the London & South Western Railway in 1875, the ferry service ceased, and Victoria Pier became a pleasure pier only, with public baths at the head and a swimming platform at the dry end. By 1900, use of the bathing facilities was declining, and the second pier gradually became derelict. The austerity of the First World War led to it being considered redundant and a hazard, and in 1916, its demolition was authorised by Act of Parliament. By the 1920s it had gone
